My journey with Reason+

[scotward57]

I was a Reason+ subscriber for 2+ years after previously upgrading to Reason 11 suite.

At first, I thought it was a good deal, getting all of those Rack Extensions made by Reason Studios "for free". I would roll my eyes at Reason users who stuck to their guns with owning a Reason license. They whined about Objekt being too expensive and stuff like that.

But this year, when the $199 annual subscription came due and with R12 upgrade on sale for $99, I switched back.

I took a hard look at what a Reason + subscription really offered me. First of all, I was never a big fan of the sound packs. At least not what was on offer. I hated the whole genre schtick or what other Reason ambassadors thought was cool or cutting edge. Second, while I'm sure there are plenty of great patches or setups within those sound packs, there was no easy way of really previewing what those patches did or how they were set up outside of going through them one patch at a time. For the ones I downloaded, I didn't find anything particularly useful or special.

The other negative for me is that for the $199 I spent two years in a row, I wondered if I would have been better off just buying the upgrade to R12 to begin with and then deciding one at a time to buy one of the players or new devices. Or even better, spend that money on a VST plugin that meets or surpasses what these new Reason devices would do.

I'm one of those users who could probably just move on from Reason since I own Logic Pro. I would have been happy just keeping my Reason 11 suite license but the whole Apple native M chip thing made upgrading to R12 essential for running RRP properly in Logic Pro.

But also I do like the Mimic sampler and Combinator 2. And now that I have regained that sense of ownership, then I will probably enjoy using them even more.

I'm curious about what other Reason users think about this and if they experienced any similar journey.

[PhillipOrdonez]

Welcome back to the perpetual club, mate. Now you are no longer allowed to roll eyes at us!

[cocoazenith]

I too found their packs lackluster during the months that I trialed Reason+ (a total of 6).

The fact you cannot find expansions for Reason Studios' newer instruments sucks, and while you'd expect differently, the subscription service doesn't change that.

[avasopht]

I'm curious about what other Reason users think about this and if they experienced any similar journey.

I've had R+ for free for quite a while through promo deals, and I was never too invested in it (despite it being pretty awesome) because I could not commit to it.

I subscribe to Adobe Creative Cloud (and a few other full package subscriptions) that I barely use, but there's something about R+ that does not sit right even though it's something I would use much more.

I don't see the value of subscribing for £20/mo without any long-term benefits (such as getting a permanent license after spending £1,000).

I might feel differently about it after the next release.

[artmessiah]

I too found their packs lackluster during the months that I trialed Reason+ (a total of 6).

The fact you cannot find expansions for Reason Studios' newer instruments sucks, and while you'd expect differently, the subscription service doesn't change that.

Exactly this. The packs are great in some ways because you can see the potential of the instruments used to make them, but there are barely any significant expansion packs for Objekt, Scenic, Algoritm, and a host of other REs. You're right the subscription is not worth it in my very humble opinion. I think (just my dumbass opinion) the golden era of Reason was back in the Reason Station days where there was sharing of songs, patches, etc because we all used the same tool completely. Props/Reason Studios will have to do something drastic to the daw/workflow/business model, to change that opinion for me. I've Been perpetual since Reason 2.5, not ever going to subscription again.

[Steedus]

The packs never interested me as they were focused on specific genres I wasn't interested in - and at least at the time it felt like 8 out of 10 packs were focused on Trap. Definitely not my thing.

Since my initial subscription ran out, and I came to the realisation that all the songs I'd worked on during the subscription period could no longer be opened (my latest perpetual license was 11 Suite), I didn't want to worry about that again and just bought the upgrade to 12.

In the time since, I've picked up a couple of their new devices in special bundles/sales. I figure that's probably the best route for how I use the software. Unless the perpetual licenses go away, I can't see me going back to subscription.

[Aosta]

Talking of soundpacks what happened to that guy from RS who wouldn't shut up about them and tried to sell them as some kind of revolutionary sound library..was he called Jeremy?

[antic604]

Talking of soundpacks what happened to that guy from RS who wouldn't shut up about them and tried to sell them as some kind of revolutionary sound library..was he called Jeremy?

You probably mean James (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamespember/)?

He's not with RS anymore. He was a good guy, though. I even had a video call with him once and he sounded very genuine, interested and enthusiastic about Reason. Would love to hear why he left...

[antic604]

I've had R+ for free for quite a while through promo deals, and I was never too invested in it (despite it being pretty awesome) because I could not commit to it.

This.

[Aosta]

You probably mean James (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamespember/)?

He's not with RS anymore. He was a good guy, though. I even had a video call with him once and he sounded very genuine, interested and enthusiastic about Reason. Would love to hear why he left...

Yes that is the guy, he seemed to me as a bit of a corporate freelancer who gets hired to hype products then moves on.

[Quarmat]

James is a good fellow. He left RS to get closer to his loved ones, since he's Australian.

[selig]

I still believe that Reason’s subscription model doesn’t work for anyone already invested in a ‘perpetual’ license. It’s also not that great of a deal if you don’t want any of the additional REs (or the sound packs).
But for someone just starting out and wanting “everything”, it appears to be far cheaper over time to go with the subscription. For all others, not so much.

[scotward57]

I still believe that Reason’s subscription model doesn’t work for anyone already invested in a ‘perpetual’ license. It’s also not that great of a deal if you don’t want any of the additional REs (or the sound packs).
But for someone just starting out and wanting “everything”, it appears to be far cheaper over time to go with the subscription. For all others, not so much.

Maybe that's it! When I upgraded to R11Suite, I thought it was a great deal. I was rather surprised Reason Studios went the subscription direction, but was willing to give it a go when they promised boat loads of goodies. But I'm happy to have a perpetual license once again. And I no longer feel the need for hoping Reason Studios evolves into something more than it is now. It's still my favorite app for drums and for some sound design stuff. The Pitch editor, time stretching and Regroove mixer remain the best tools available for those chores IMO.

[Bes]

sympathy for your experience scotward.

if i'd been making decisions at RS about this i would have pushed it to highscool and university educators and focused on maybe even making a syllabus or getting educators to design a RE or two. we didn't have electronic music class when i was at school but seems daft to not have one today.

[Jackjackdaw]

I paid $114 in September ‘21 for R12 upgrade and haven’t spent anything on Reason ever since and I use it all the time.

[scotward57]

sympathy for your experience scotward.

if i'd been making decisions at RS about this i would have pushed it to highscool and university educators and focused on maybe even making a syllabus or getting educators to design a RE or two. we didn't have electronic music class when i was at school but seems daft to not have one today.

No worries. I like your education idea!

[DaveyG]

The other negative for me is that for the $199 I spent two years in a row,

That's why companies love subscriptions. It gives them a regular income stream and they tend to earn more from each customer over the longer term.

As Giles said, the sub makes more sense to a complete newbie but even then if you are in it for the longer term then a perpetual licence makes more sense. Perhaps using a sub to start with then buying the licence plus the REs you'll actually use might make some sense. I think the soundpacks have little value for many people. It sounds like a great idea but the ones I've seen were not particularly special and I think I'd waste too much time trying to audition them all them before discarding them! It's like those subs that boast of access to a massive collection of loops/sample/sounds and then they put an insane value on them ("A $4K value!"), as if anyone would ever buy them all or even have time to listen to them all. It's clever marketing, nothing more.

The real downside to a Reason sub is that it's hard to stop because you'll lose access to all your songs and have nothing to show for your money so the pressure is always there to keep it going. Clever marketing again. Somewhere on the wall in RS HQ will be a graph of subscriber numbers and a list of targets.

[joeyluck]

Well particularly for someone just starting out, assuming there is always new REs and new versions of Reason, I think it could be argues that the R+ subscription would still save money indefinitely.

You have to account for the cost of Reason, every existing RE, and then account for new versions of Reason and new REs. The price of Reason+ per year is already less than buying the content released within the year.

If someone looks at Reason+ as just renting access to the version of the DAW they are using today, then I would say they are looking at it the wrong way. If I just want to watch Return of the Jedi over and over again, maybe I should consider buying the movie rather than subscribing to Disney+ to do that. Doesn't mean Disney+ is a bad deal and doesn't mean buying movies is the wrong choice.

[avasopht]

You have to account for the cost of Reason, every existing RE, and then account for new versions of Reason and new REs. The price of Reason+ per year is already less than buying the content released within the year.

This means nothing to most people who won't need every R+ device and was never going to buy many of them.

[crimsonwarlock]

You have to account for the cost of Reason, every existing RE...

Every existing RE is definitely NOT included in R+, only Reason Studio's own REs.

[dakta]

I'm pro subscription but only because I like having all the (RS) devices, I don't have to worry about update fees and quite frankly, whilst £20 a month seems a lot, it's actually (dare I say it?) not a tonne more than I could spend on streaming services and a whole tonne more fun. It's less than the fuel cost if I have to go into the office one day in a month.

I would prefer to own everything perpetually - I know in the long term you spend more on SaaS models, but I'm mindful that a business to survive does need a constant revenue stream and I want Reason to live.

If it weren't for R+ and all the offers I'd probably still be on v5 *yikes*

Have to admit I don't pay too much attention to the sound packs, I've had a mooch on occasion but generally don't look at it too much. The full library of RS RE's and access to the full version pretty much floats my boat.

[arnigretar]

I agree completely with this post I think I posted something similar after thinking that the Reason+ would be something for me. But after seeing for myself that I didn't use the packs except for selected few - and I owned most of the instruments anyway - that it would be kinda weird paying for something monthly. I think the idea is fine - for a company reaching out to more customers. But I'm guessing Reason studios isn't big enough that this could work for everybody - like for myself. I'm not into those new music styles and if there was something that should be interesting to me - most of it was just not good enough to use in actual work. Some pack creators are good though, not blaming them per se - and like I said I did use some, but maybe 5 of 50 or so. So I went back to perpetual club last year. And for a fact, even though I thought I spoke good english, I didn't know perpetual was a word until Reason+ service came about! haha But good luck to the company and hopefully they just keep improving for us who use Reason.

[avasopht]

£20/mo is not much.

That's not the issue.

It just doesn't feel right.

I'm paying £24/mo for a Jetbrains subscription (which gives you a permanent licence up to the latest version that's been out during your last 12 months of subscribing.

I'm already paying for Adobe creative cloud (all products).

It can be useful for finding out which devices you work best with, but it's hard to convince people to part ways with cash for that purpose.

But RS say subscriptions have been successful so maybe there's some other appeal that isn't so obvious.

[WaxTrax]

If I just want to watch Return of the Jedi over and over again, maybe I should consider buying the movie rather than subscribing to Disney+ to do that. Doesn't mean Disney+ is a bad deal and doesn't mean buying movies is the wrong choice.

I love this analogy -- it's one of the best ways I've seen this argument put, in my opinion.

[PhillipOrdonez]

£20/mo is not much.

That's not the issue.

It just doesn't feel right.

I'm paying £24/mo for a Jetbrains subscription (which gives you a permanent licence up to the latest version that's been out during your last 12 months of subscribing.

I'm already paying for Adobe creative cloud (all products).

It can be useful for finding out which devices you work best with, but it's hard to convince people to part ways with cash for that purpose.

But RS say subscriptions have been successful so maybe there's some other appeal that isn't so obvious.

I do think 20 per month is too much.